Engineering the porosity of colloidal gels via shape and patchiness Carina Karner and Emanuela Bianchi Technical University of Vienna, Austria Colloids with localized bonding sites commonly referred to as patchy particles, have sparked a considerable amount of interest for their ability to form equilibrium gels at low density [1] . In two dimensions, these low density colloidal gels are porous monolayers that can be utilized for filtration at the nano- and micro scale as well as for optical applications, where their disordered nature may even support the formation of a material with a full photonic band gap [2] . In this work, we investigate the formation and properties of two-dimensional gels from shape anisotropic colloids -- such as ellipsoids as well as rhombic and triangular platelets, each decorated with several patches. We find that by varying the patch placement on the particle surface, the number and the size of the patches, we can favour the formation of gels over open and close-packed crystals, clusters and chains [3,4,5,6] . In the gel states, a gradual variation of the patch position controls the geometric properties of the forming networks such as pore size and shape, typical local bonding motives and branch-thickness. Our research shows that gels from shape anisotropic colloids assemble into highly versatile network topologies, that may be utilized for applications at the nano and micro scale. References
1. Soft Matter, 6, 2010, 6, 4229-4236 2. PNAS, 106 (49), 2009, 20658–20663 3. Nano Lett., 19 (11) 2019, 7806–7815 4. Int. J. Mol. Sci. 21(22), 2020, 8621 5. Soft Matter, 2020,16, 2774-2785 6. J. Phys. Condens. Matter, 32(20), 2020, 204001
RD04
© The Author(s), 2023
Made with FlippingBook Learn more on our blog